51 PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, plaintiff and appellee, vs.

NATIVIDAD LUAGUE and WENCESLAO

ALCANSARE, defendants and appellants. G.R. No. L-43588 | November 7, 1935 Recto, J.:

FACTS:

 Review of the judgment rendered against them, praying that the same be reversed and that
they be acquitted.
 That in the morning of February 18, 1935, while the accused Natividad Luague was in her house
situated in Lupuhan, barrio of Agpañgi, municipality of Calatrava, Occidental Negros, with only
her three children of tender age for company, her husband and co accused Wenceslao Alcansare
having gone to grind corn in Juan Garing's house several kilometers away.
 Paulino Disuasido came and began to make love to her; that as Natividad could not dissuade him
from his purpose, she started for the kitchen where Paulino followed her, notwithstanding her
insistence that she could by no means accede to his wishes.
 For Paulino, bent on satisfying them at all cost, drew and opened a knife and, threatening her
with death, began to embrace her and to touch her breasts;
 That in preparing to lie with her, Paulino had to leave the knife on the floor and the accused,
taking advantage of the situation, picked up the weapon and stabbed him in the abdomen;
 That Paulino, feeling himself wounded, ran away jumping through the window and falling on
some stones, while the accused set forth immediately for the poblacion to surrender herself to
the authorities and report the incident.

ISSUES:

 Whether the attempt to rape a woman constitute an aggression sufficient to put her in a state
of legitimate defense.
 Whether the judge committed an error in giving unusual importance to the testimony of the
two policemen who testified that they made an ocular inspection of the scene of the crime and
found no bloodstain in the kitchen of the house of the accused spouses.

HELD:

 We are of the opinion that we should, as we do hereby hold that the accused Natividad Luague
in wounding Paulino Disuasido to death, acted in legitimate self-defense, and that the other
accused Wenceslao Alcansare had no participation in said act;
 Wherefore, reversing the appealed judgment, we hereby acquit both accused, and order their
immediate release, if in confinement, with costs de oficio.
 We are of the opinion that the trial judge erred on this point as he did on others. It appears that
the said policemen did not also find any bloodstain on the threshold of the house of the accused
spouses where, according to the prosecution, the aggression took place.
 Therefore, said testimony contradicts the defense no less than it does the prosecution.

REASON FOR DECISION: In as much as a woman’s honor cannot but be esteemed as a right as precious,
if not more, cannot her very existence; this offense, unlike ordinary slander by word or deed susceptible
of judicial redress, in an outrage which impresses an indelible blot on the victim, for, as the Roman Law
says: quum virginitas, vel castitas, corupta restitui non protest (because virginity or chastity, once
defiled, cannot be restored). It is evident that a woman who, imperiled, wounds, nay kills the offender,
should be afforded exemption from criminal liability provided by this article and subsection since such
killing cannot be considered a crime from the moment it became the only means left for her to protect
her honor from so great an outrage.